


Coffee Break

by palimpsestus



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Time Travel, short fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-21
Updated: 2020-08-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:14:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26029288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/palimpsestus/pseuds/palimpsestus
Summary: Its not every night that your younger self crosses a dimensional portal to speak with you. The least Kathryn can do is offer a coffee.
Relationships: Chakotay/Kathryn Janeway
Comments: 14
Kudos: 69





	Coffee Break

It wasn’t entirely without guilt that Kathryn placed the French Press under the hot top and sent bubbling water streaming down into the coffee grinds. The window above the sink looked out onto an inky night, stars and starships blinking over the black fields. But Kathryn had work to do, a legitimate excuse for a very bad habit, and she smiled to herself as the aroma reached her. She set the plunger atop the glass, and gathered up her mug, prepared to cross the kitchen toward her office, when a sharp thwoop of ions hit her tongue and a tiny, frail little thing seemed to stumble out from the hallway.

This thing, small and wobbling from the effects of the space-time dilation, had a tangle of bright red hair pushed back from her face, a ferocious snarl on her lips, her fists clenched, and it was the stark black and maroon of the uniform that gave Kathryn the ‘oh’ of recognition.

“Hello,” she said, as though this was a normal occurrence. “Coffee?”

Kathryn stared back at Kathryn, eyes flicking manically from the proffered carafe, to the door to the window and finally to the open office door at the other side of the hall. She was still ready to fire a phaser at any moment.

“It’s 2399,” Kathryn continued, deciding to move towards the sun room instead of the office. Less tactical information on display, fewer pictures of _Voyager’s_ return, fewer highlight of the next twenty years of Starfleet history. “It’s August, it’s late at night,” Kathryn gestured to the dark skies outside, “and yes, this is Earth.”

“Who are you?” her younger self snapped, her voice nearly cracking with strain.

Kathryn didn’t turn, although she wanted to rush forward and embrace the little thing. She supposed she looked different, so much happier, so much stronger, and at Chakotay’s hopeful request, she had allowed her hair to remain snowy white. Instead she settled herself on the loveseat and pulled a blanket over her knees, beginning the preparation of the coffee.

“Are you . . .” her younger self followed slowly, taking a long look around the house. Her gaze tripped over a carving on the kitchen wall, and she stepped down into the tiled sunroom with her eyes on the blanket’s pattern. “Are you me?” she asked softly.

Kathryn let herself smile as she looked up. “I hope it’s not too much of a disappointment,” she said, and poured the coffee while her younger self, _Captain_ Janeway, sat slowly on the far sofa. “Here.” She slid the coffee cup across the table and sat back, letting Janeway figure out how close she wanted to get. “You look like you need it more than I do.”

“It’s been a rough day,” Janeway agreed, clearing her throat before she reached for the mug. “I don’t want to ask if you remember . . .”

“There were a lot of time travel incidents,” Kathryn said breezily. “I’d be lying if I said I remembered them all.”

Janeway was nodding slowly, staring into the cup clasped between her palms. “But you get home,” she said slowly.

“We did,” Kathryn agreed. She wondered if Chakotay had felt the time-space dilation, if he could hear the quiet conversation, if at any moment there would be a heavy tread on the stairs and he would walk through, hiding a yawn behind his knuckles and asking why she hadn’t finished her speech yet. She wondered how little Janeway might react to that, if she’d feel a flood of relief and hope, or if it would feel so far away from her reality that it was almost a slap in the face, a reminder of everything that was beyond her reach. Kathryn remembered living in both states, in the seven lonely years.

Janeway nodded, her gaze unfocussed. She sipped the coffee. Her eyelids seemed to droop as though her eyelashes were made of lead, and she was tired of holding them up. “Oh that’s good coffee,” she murmured.

It was. It was her favourite. It was the nicest coffee in the quadrant. She often went to speak with the farmer, a former warrior who now enjoyed the Venezuelan heat and toiled over his beans with all the devotion he might reserve for Kahless. Kathryn nodded to her younger self. She smoothed her fingers over the blanket.

“I can’t stay long,” Janeway murmured. “I’d like to,” she half laughed, bitter, “but the phase shifting is pretty regular.”

Kathryn nodded, she didn’t need to understand. “Anything else you need? Food? Bathroom?”

Janeway managed a smile. “No, but thank you. Its nice to just sit. You would not believe, or maybe you would,” she trailed off again. “I have to ask though.”

Kathryn held the gaze of her younger self. She thought that their eyes were probably the greatest giveaway. She felt as though she was looking in her bathroom mirror. 

Janeway took a deep breath. “Is it worth it? Is getting them home worth all the pain?”

Somehow, Kathryn hadn’t been expecting that. She’d been expecting some question like _what do I need to look out for, where’s the wormhole that will get me home, will it work out between Chakotay and me?_ This was a question she’d only ever wondered in her darkest hours, if it might not be better to just slip away, and leave the pips behind. She traced the pattern of the blanket, from Chakotay’s tribe, from the last time they’d visited the Dorvan system, an evening spent under the stars and laughing at his terrible jokes, and drinking good beer as they watched the sunrise. Was that worth it?

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Temporal prime directive,” Janeway agreed, frustrated.

“No.” Kathryn smoothed her hand over the wool. “Because the past doesn’t justify the future. Pain doesn’t mean happiness has to follow. What’s good now could change tomorrow. I think I’ve learned, with all the time travel, that you just have to enjoy what you can, when you can. Like a cup of coffee with a friend.”

Janeway winced, clutching at her head.

“Another jump?”

Janeway nodded, grimacing. “I don’t have long.”

“Safe voyages,” Kathryn murmured, and with the same tang of ion on her tongue, Janeway seemed to flicker out of existence, the mug sitting on the coffee table.

For a while, Kathryn watched the stars, something dark stirring inside her. She set the blanket aside, and instead of taking the coffee pot to the sink, or returning to her work, she climbed the stairs, feeling the stiffness in her knee and in her back. She walked through her home, pushing the bedroom door open to find Chakotay a slumbering figure beneath the sheets. He stirred as she climbed in beside him. “Okay?”

“Go back to sleep,” she said, curling herself around him, and smiling as he rolled to make his side available.

“Finish your speech?” he mumbled, not opening his eyes. “Thought I heard you rehearse.”

“No.” She closed her eyes. “Decided I’d rather be here instead.”

That must have satisfied him, because he draped his arm over her shoulder, and his breathing deepened. Kathryn rested her head on his chest, and smiled.

**Author's Note:**

> I've found the last few months rough - and I've not been inspired to write at all. So . . . yeah. Have this.


End file.
